


Home for Christmas

by TGITFangirl (SilverMillennium_QueenNeptune)



Category: Station 19 (TV)
Genre: Car Accidents, Christmas, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Drunk Driving, F/M, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Married Couple, Married Life, Past Character Death, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:26:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27944513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverMillennium_QueenNeptune/pseuds/TGITFangirl
Summary: Contains some slight time changes for the current season of Station 19.  Robert is away from his wife as he attempts to battle his demons. But even he cannot resist coming home for the holidays when he learns of the chaos that the year has handed to Andy.
Relationships: Andy Herrera/Robert Sullivan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 19
Collections: AO3 Haven Facebook December Challenge: Holidays Smutmas Awareness and Prevention 2020





	1. Chapter 1

Robert Sullivan’s apartment was suffocating him and he knew it. It had been months since he had allowed himself to breathe, or to think about what his life had become over the last year. He looked around the empty space, littered with small messes he’d neglected to clean because he was the only one here and it did not matter. Nothing mattered here right now, not when he was fighting for his life every single day. 

He sighed, placing his head in his hands so that he did not have to look at the picture on the nightstand. Every time he glanced at the photo, it broke his heart. This was not how things were supposed to be right now. He was not supposed to be doing this. He should be with his wife. He forced himself to look at the picture. Staring back at him was a beautiful woman in a blush pink dress, her makeup impeccable and hair drawn back into an elegant updo, tears and love shining in her eyes as she held onto him. She held him as though letting him go would unravel her and she would fall apart. That had been months ago, when they were happy and. . . He paused for a breath as his eyes fell on the other man in the photo, his sunken features betraying an illness that would have robbed them of sharing the joys of their union if he had not beat it to the punch. 

God, how he missed Andy. He wanted to hold her, to tell her that it was all going to be okay. He wanted to say that he loved her and they were going to make her father proud and honor the legacy he had left behind. Robert’s self imposed exile was only temporary. He had to get better for himself and for Andy. He hated himself for being an addict, for letting the disease get the better of him and tearing him away from the woman he loved who needed him. 

He hated that people judged him because she had been his subordinate. He knew the whispers; how they thought he had manipulated her into sleeping with him. That was not what had happened; Andy had vouched for it time and again. She had made the choice to get involved with him. They had weathered storms before and they would get through this one too. But he could not leave her. The bottom had nearly fallen out when someone told him that he wasn’t thinking clearly when he had fallen in love with her; that he was irrational and taking advantage when he asked her to become his wife. They thought that the moment he had professed to love her was a thinly veiled attempt at manipulation. But it wasn’t that easy. 

Andy had been his salvation, the person that made him want to get better. His world had gone dark before her. She had become the one person who gave him a reason to try again and made him feel like he mattered. Now, he wanted her here. He knew why she couldn’t be. He had to do this on his own. He had made the choice to love her when he was sick. It could have been the drugs. If they stayed together before he got the help he needed, everything would fall apart. He wanted to care about that, wanted to put her above himself and say that he had finally made a better choice for once in his life. But there was only one problem. 

She was his home. Not this place with empty walls and orderly chaos. It was missing her warmth and love; the way she encircled her arms around him as they slept and pulled him closer, the scent of her hair and her perfume. He had given her up for the sake of his sobriety, and that advice had been given to him by someone who had been through it all before. But she had made him a better person, and he could not last without her. This was not what his father in law would have wanted. 

Pruitt Hererra had not hacked his way through an unstable roof to save their lives so that they could live apart like this. Maybe he should consult someone before making this decision; call Richard or Amelia and let them tell him that he was being a fool. Maybe they would say that he was the only thing keeping himself from his wife, from his home. Maybe he needed some kind of a sign. That was when the phone rang. He checked the number, and his heart dropped. It took him a moment to collect himself before he could answer. When he did, the voice on the other end was teary. 

“Robert. I’m sorry. I know we said this was better, but I need—.”

“Andy? Are you okay, baby? You sound upset, what’s wrong?”

“I need you to come home for Christmas. It’s—It’s a long story, but I can explain if you give me the time. I have some people I need you to meet.” He couldn’t help feeling just a little inadequate. She deserved so much better than him and this broken shell that he had become when the drugs took over. That was the other reason he needed to get better; she needed him. The family they were meant to be needed him to get better. 

“I’ll be right there.” Robert knew he did not have the time to say anything more. He was not about to abandon the woman he loved when she needed him most, even if he was a mess. He owed her that much. He was going home, to the woman he loved who needed him. No one cared if it was risky, because she meant more to him than anything else.  
  
If only Robert had known exactly what he was getting into. But he also knew that whatever was wrong, he would love her through it. He intended to keep his promise. For better or worse. Right now, they were going through the worst, but it would get better one day. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andy knows how damaged her relationships have been, but she's willing to do whatever it takes to make things with Robert work. But does fate have other plans for them?

Andy wanted to deny that she was falling apart, but as soon as her husband got off the phone, she nearly burst into tears. She had gone through too much pain lately, too many revelations that had torn her apart and ruined the beauty of her world. Where was she even supposed to start?

Her best friend at work had been put up for the promotion that was supposed to be hers. The boy who had been there for her since childhood was gone. Her relationship had fallen apart when the aforementioned best friend slept with her co-worker behind her back and neither of them had the decency to say a damned word to her until she caught them. Andy had retaliated by getting involved with Robert Sullivan, her Battalion Chief. . . The man she had expected to tell her no because she was his subordinate and she didn’t need to be under him in more ways than one. She didn’t need further complications, and yet, for some stupid reason, she had pushed the relationship. Then, right as things were getting good, the worst possible thing had happened.

Her father had gotten the news that he was dying. It was cancer, aggressive, and he did not have long. The revelation had spurred her into action. It had shown her that her relationship with Sullivan was deeper than what she’d had with Jack Gibson. This wasn’t some hot, secret, sexy bubble. Okay, so maybe a secret work romance was a little forbidden and sexy, and Andy kind of liked the idea of sneaking around with Robert. But she had also known when she started it that he would not be satisfied that way for long. Robert Sullivan was not either of her exes. He was not sweet, innocent Ryan who wanted to love her and make her the woman he could show off to the world and scream from the rooftops how much he adored her. But he also wasn’t raw, damaged, broken Jack, who hadn’t known how to express his feelings, and when she rejected him, had climbed into bed with her bisexual best friend.

No, Robert was a man with feelings and needs who knew deep losses and was looking for someone to share his burdens. Andy had wondered if that was meant to be her. She longed for someone like him who could, for once, make her feel the ground beneath her feet. She had spent so long fighting fires that she had begun to feel the flames even when they were not there. She was supposed to have the day off from work today; supposed to be meeting her Tía Sandra and some of the rest of her mother’s family.

When her father died, Andy had spent what felt like a lifetime going through his things. It was, perhaps, one of the most foolish mistakes she had made since she had been a wild and rebellious teenager. Andy had begun to believe that she had never left that phase of her life behind, but she knew better. She had been trying to rebel for years. She wanted to prove to her father that she was an adult, capable of shouldering the legacy he had built as the captain of Station 19. Sleeping with Jack Gibson and Ryan Tanner had made her feel like she wasn’t some sheltered little girl anymore, despite the fact that they both handled her with kid gloves. But all it had shown her father was that she was ill-prepared to lead. He had named her best friend at the station as her Captain, leaving Andy with a crisis.

What would she do now? Her mind brought her back to the recent past; to the day Maya had gotten her comeuppance and their friendship had been restored. That was the day Robert Sullivan had come into her life. Andy could count four times that her life had been flipped completely on its head or back again. Meeting Robert was one of the worst of those times. Now she was dealing with two more: Pruitt Herrera, the father who had spent his entire life trying to shelter her, was dead just months after seeing her marry Robert. Then, while going through her father’s things, Andy had discovered he had been lying to her for years about her mother’s side of the family. Instead of being horrible people, they had been incredibly sweet, welcoming her in and loving her. They had promised to always be there for her. She needed that assurance; her husband was facing an addiction that she could not help him through, one she worried was her fault.

Andy knew seeing him right now was not the best idea. But for the first time in a very long time, she could be honest with herself and admit that she needed him. Christmas was coming. Even addicts were usually released from their programs for Christmas. That would mean that Robert would be with her. She could finally bring him into her world, surrounded by the family that God had given back to her. But a part of her was terrified that it would be too much for him; that being with her would send him spiraling back to the drugs and the darkness that had changed the man she loved.

  
 _Please, God, don’t let that happen. I just want a peaceful Christmas with my family. If I can’t have my father here, then at least let me have my husband home where he belongs._ It was too bad that fires and disasters never took a holiday.


End file.
